182 PCA Episode..... what was new? What happened? Who did we piss off.....

Episode Summary

Episode 182 is a post-PCA 2021 debrief recorded straight off the plane from Las Vegas, with both hosts running on zero sleep. Unlike previous years, they attended as retailers rather than exhibitors, which gave them the freedom to walk the whole floor — and that's exactly the problem they report. By their estimate the show occupied roughly 40% of the contracted Sands Expo space, with a wall dividing off registration, almost no food vendors, and a floor they had fully walked within three hours of opening. They trace the decline to 2019, when the "four horsemen" — Drew Estate, Altadis, Davidoff and General — pulled out of the PCA, and to the absence of the big national retailers (Atlantic was there; they didn't see Famous or Cigars International) whose five-figure orders make the math work for brands.

The hosts argue the mid-tier brands were the real beneficiaries: Dunbarton Tobacco & Trust, Crowned Heads, Tatuaje, Espinosa and Rocky Patel had the busiest booths, and several launched PCA-exclusive releases (Crowned Heads and a round Gordo anniversary Padrón built to order). But access was so easy that Steve Saka, Erik Espinosa and even George Padrón had time to sit and shoot the shit for twenty minutes — a telling sign of a slow show. They call out the industry's "intrinsic apathy" and reflexive optimism: everyone claims they "killed it," which the hosts compare to the Black Knight in Monty Python insisting a severed arm is "a mere scratch."

The bulk of the back half is a serious discussion of whether the PCA convention can survive, and how the association funds its legislative work if it can't. They walk through the rumored five-year Sands contract, the $60,000 fundraising email, Eddie Tarazona's $10,000 donation, and whether a voluntary tithe/percentage model from brands could work on the honor system. There's an extended analogy to gun owners and the NRA, a question about whether Cigar Rights of America still exists, and a reminder that consumers only notice advocacy failures after regulations like tobacco-21 land.

Lighter moments include an older Polish gentleman recognizing the Powstanie bear story at a red light, a brutal Auntie Anne's line at the Vegas airport, Lenny from Oliva's brilliant pre-bagged lighter/cutter giveaway swag, Ronnie Hayeshi dwarfed next to Jack from Espinosa, and their favorite part of the trip — an off-the-record night at the media house with Coop, Bear, Ben, Aaron Loomis and Charlie Minato of halfwheel. They close by teasing next week's review of "the Sarge" (great cigar, terrible band and packaging) and possibly La Parcha, with the real dirt saved for Patreon.

In This Episode

1. 01
   Post-PCA, no sleep, straight off the plane
   The hosts set up the episode as an honest, unfiltered recap recorded after 48 hours awake and no trip home yet.
2. 02
   The Powstanie bear story goes mainstream
   A Polish driver flags Mike down at a red light because he recognizes the bear that fought in the war — without knowing the cigar.
3. 03
   A show at 40% its size
   Walking the whole floor in three hours, a dividing wall, two food stands and the lasting damage from Drew Estate, Altadis, Davidoff and General pulling out in 2019.
4. 04
   Who actually benefited
   Dunbarton, Crowned Heads, Tatuaje, Espinosa and Rocky Patel had the busiest booths and new releases, capitalizing on the big four's absence.
5. 05
   PCA exclusives and how they're built
   Crowned Heads and Padrón's show-only cigars, built to order after the fact, and whether 'PCA exclusive' really means exclusive.
6. 06
   Access as a symptom: Saka, Erik Espinosa and George Padrón
   Twenty-minute hallway conversations with brand owners that would be impossible at a healthy show.
7. 07
   Can the PCA convention survive?
   The rumored five-year Sands contract, the $60,000 fundraising push, tithing models, Eddie Tarazona's donation and whether advocacy funding can replace the show.
8. 08
   Advocacy, apathy and the NRA analogy
   Why retailers and brands — not consumers — have to fund the fight, and whether Cigar Rights of America is even still active.
9. 09
   Best and worst of the week
   An off-camera night at the media house with Coop, Bear and Aaron Loomis versus the relentless 'best show ever' spin on the floor.
10. 10
    Coming up: the Sarge and La Parcha
    A tease of next week's Patreon review of the much-hyped cigar with bad packaging, plus a second smoke they still have two of.

Brands & Cigars Discussed

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Transcript

It's perfect. They can't see me now, so I won't mess it up. I can see you. I can see you.

No, you. I see you right here. Welcome to episode 182 of Cigar Hustler Podcast, the post-PCA edition. So post, I still have not been home.

Yeah. That is how post this is. Right off the plane. How close this is, right off the plane.

We haven't slept. We've not slept since? Sunday, Saturday. What is today?

Today, Tuesday? I think it's Monday. It's still Monday. Yeah.

We've not slept since Saturday night. Saturday night. A little cat napping on the airplane? Yes.

Recharging. Recharging. No, I'm not recharging. There's been no recharging done at all.

I can tell. You too can become part of our podcast family and invest in our show. Put your products in front of thousands of listeners and viewers every episode. We are heard on 12 different podcast providers weekly all around the world.

com. com. Still have not heard from Mr. Long Dog Wong or whatever his name was.

Yeah, trying to get back to us. Yes, he's not gotten back to us. There's no samples that have arrived, so I feel maybe he lost interest. But we...

We couldn't hang. Oh wait, I have a break, this is not a PCA thing, but this happened today after I left your house. Oh, you were very excited about this. Oh, it's hilarious.

Alright, I'm driving from your house. Yes. I'm on 430-60 there, okay, guy honks his arm, beep, beep, beep, point to the car, and I thought, okay, fine, just somebody who knows the brand or something. It happens all the time.

So, an old man's in the window, he rolled out his car window and he waved, and then up at the red light, he stops, and I stop, and he starts talking. He's an older Polish man. Yeah, he's just busting out Polish on you. Well, no, no, no, he goes, I'm very familiar with it, whatever the Polish accent ends, very familiar with the bear story, I like the bear, he helped fight in the war, he's very good, thank you, good job.

He sounds slightly Irish, because you've been Conor McGregorin. Yeah, I've been Conor McGregorin for two days, I understand, so, but I can't, but it was just funny. Your wife's in my DMs. Right, and he goes, your wife's in my DMs.

But he knew nothing about the cigar, but he knew the bear story. Yeah. But that was kind of cool. It's a good story.

As he goes, it's a good story. He's like, he's helped fight in the war. I'm like, yeah, way to go. And then we shoved him in the zoo when we were done.

I'm a big fan. To the Irish, actually. He went to the Irish zoo. In the Irish zoo.

Where somebody yelled at, you're in my DMs. Where he collected his. I'll fight you right now. Retirement fund, I don't know.

Did he get a pension? Did he get pension? All the cigarettes and beer he could handle. I can hear my voice is like raspy, and I didn't really do like a tremendous amount of talking, not as much as like, kept yelling at me, well you fucking pissed me off, you're a pain in my ass, we spent 48 hours together completely, no separation, oh my god, it was a lot, there was some separation, it was a lot, sometimes we didn't pee at the same time during the show, go get me an ice cream cone, get out of here, I didn't get my gelato, I went once, the line was too long, I hate lines, I won't do lines, yeah me too, I'm not really I'm like, you know what?

I'm not even sure if I'm in the line. I was working in the line. I did do the pretzel for you today. You did.

That was a long ass line. We had two hours to kill. Last night. Yeah.

I killed the entire thing in the pretzel line. We were at the, that was at the airport. The Vegas airport last night. Apparently the only food opened after 11:00 is Auntie, Auntie something?

Auntie M's? Auntie Anne's. How do you know Auntie Anne's? I don't know.

The pretzel people. Huge ass line in a part of the airport where there's no air conditioning. Slowest people in the world worked there. I don't know what the problem was.

They don't give a fuck. No, the one girl didn't, she didn't care. You know. The people in front of me, God bless them, they were Indian, she couldn't understand a word they were saying, and they wanted cheese pizza, that's how I know how long it took.

They wanted two cheese pizzas, I have a pepperoni. I just wouldn't get a pizza from a pretzel place. Well, what else? Your options are limited.

Right. But they obviously didn't want the pepperoni because they're Indian, so they're probably vegetarian, so they couldn't eat the meat. I would have said that it was, you know. Then it's great.

Broccoli, pepperoni. Oh, there's pepperoni? No, there's pepperoni. Yeah, no, no, that's a vegetarian pepperoni.

Yeah, this is a, it's actually circles of cheese isn't what it is, a very red cheese. Burnt, it's burnt spicy cheese. Yeah, you're welcome. All right, enough about the food.

Yeah. Where should we start? Where should we start, Mike? Man, there's a lot to cover.

There's a lot to do. Well, I think that we need to start with a disclaimer. Okay. And the disclaimer should simply state, for one, I'm a little tired.

For two. He's a little tired. I'm way tired. So, I hope that we can convey- I think I'm a little cranky, too.

Oh, you think you're a little fucking cranky? Very cranky. Holy moly. That guy in the airplane was about to get killed today.

Anyway, please, please continue. So, I just want to, I want to fully, you know- Throw that out there. I'm going to do my best, and Mike here is going to do his best, to give you the information that we have- Honest and unbiased opinions. We had our perspective on the situation of PCA, and without really trying to discredit or smash anybody, because that's not our intention.

No, and now we should also say we were not there as a displayer this year, we were just there retailing. We were there as retailers, which I haven't done in forever, and it was really kind of refreshing, I'm not gonna lie. Yeah, a lot more freedom. Yeah, it's like, oh, what time do you want to get up?

Eh, who fucking cares? Who cares? Nobody's looking for us. I mean, it doesn't matter.

" Right. It's really 10 o'clock to your body, so it's 6:00. Get out of bed. Your body's very upset right now that you've stayed in bed this long.

And you're like, "But I just... " But I really just went to bed. I mean... Don't do this.

Don't do this to me. Don't do this to me. So you still get up and you still go there, but... We need food, dude.

Throw some food in here. Yeah, but there's no dire... You had to be there at the open. You know, you stay in the one booth that closed.

We didn't do that the first day, because we had to get our IDs and stuff, and they made us wait outside. Yeah, and we had an appointment with Dunbarton, you know. So, nitty gritty of things, just kind of paint a picture. It was probably 40% the normal size of what it should be.

It was definitely less. The room that they have allocated or contracted for something. It was less than half, I would say. I don't have a fucking measuring tape.

tape right it's an estimate but this is my third or fourth yeah show now the first time i went it was huge gigantic gigantic it is like the you know like going to the circus the cigar circus people everywhere i mean it was just unbelievable so big to a point where you can walk it and there's an entire section oh you could certainly yeah you you're like oh we didn't fucking like i'm I'm looking for this guy. We didn't go to that area. We didn't go to that side of the building, I don't think. And the food options out here, I mean, there was food everywhere on that one side.

Yeah, no, not this time, there's just like two little stands. Two people, yeah, and then that lady came over, would you like some more food? I'm lonely. We have a lot of food over here still.

Please come have some food. You're like, he bought food. I bought my pizza over there. No, no, no, no.

No, I'm good. Anyway, so as I've been going, I have seen the show shrink Over the years. Well, yeah, and it took a big hit in 2019 when these big four guys, Drew State, Altidus, Davidoff, and somebody else. Let's see, Drew State, General, but Drew State, Davidoff, Altidus, and General.

Yes, the four horsemen. The four horsemen of the cigar apocalypse. Of the cigar apocalypse pulled out of the PCA. Why is a PCA so important?

Because a PCA does a great job fighting for cigar rights on state levels, on all of it, you know. So it's important to the industry that the PCA survives. I don't know if the convention is going to survive or not. I hope it does, but we'll see.

So Mike and I walked this fucking floor. The first day. Within the first three hours. We got in at 1030.

Yeah. By 130, we're looking at each other going, so who didn't we see? Yeah, and we took meetings. Yeah, I was about to say, and that was after the meeting at Dunbar where they're probably 45 minutes.

Yeah, I mean, we hit a handful of people and we're like, I think we're done. Right. And that was kind of crazy. And then you start looking for stuff.

It's like, okay, well, maybe what else can we do? Yeah, hey, I know this guy over here. He's had to come by. He's like, let's go over there.

I hear they have a new cigar. Let's go check out ST DuPont. They got some shiny things, you know. Those are nice over there.

Which was fun, which we definitely enjoyed. The biggest issue, here's where I think that the PCA is kind of missing, and it's not really the fault, it's partially, they're partially to blame, but I don't think that they're entirely to blame. It's like the fucking Titanic and the band kind of played on scenario, have you ever seen the- Right, I was gonna say, I think they're a little disconnected on what is actually going on. So every single fucking year I've gone, it does not matter.

You talk to a significant portion of manufacturers and brand owners or sales reps or whatever. The answer is always going to be, ah, we fucking killed it. We killed it. It was amazing.

We sold so many cigars. I just, I don't know. It was amazing. It was amazing.

And it reminds me of Monty Python's Holy Grail. Right. You ever see where the two knights are fighting? Oh, yeah.

" No arm, right. Your fucking arm is gone. Cut off your leg. Right.

" I've still got two legs, I'll be fine. You're acting like Conor McGregor running around on the ground. You're icing me DMs. Yeah.

I'll kick your ass in the parking lot. I'll meet you in the parking lot right now. You got one fucking leg, Conor. Just, come on, let's get that fixed and then go kick his ass.

I mean, be reasonable. Somebody let me up! Give me Lucky Charms! So you're always filled with this, like, and for whatever, I don't get it, I don't understand, you know, like, it's this competitive nature, this egotistical fucking industry where everybody's gotta be the best, and because of that, everybody's suffering, you know, yes, I will tell you that the four major booths that were the busiest, and I feel like that's kind of a generous statement, because it didn't seem like there were a ton of people there, but...

There were a couple that always seemed to have people in it, but it didn't look like they were doing anything. Well, I mean, I'm sure that a lot of sales happened, but listen, Tatuaje, Dunbarton Tobacco, Crown Heads, you know, those are the three that come off the top of my head, and I know I'm forgetting one. Rocky was always busy. Well, yeah.

Well, Rocky was probably the biggest guy that was there. Right. Right. So, you know, those guys capitalized on other people not being there, and because of that, they probably had more sales, I guess, to some degree.

But, you know, I don't think that come day two or day three, you know, it's just, I feel like you're bleeding out really, really bad. Towards the end of day two, you could, you could see a significant slowdown. Yeah, we're like, all right, we're out of here. And, but it was never the tempo and the crowd and the cut, you know, the, the retailer level was never immense.

You know, it was never, you would see the same people if you go from, from booth to booth, you would see the same people. Yeah. So, you know, that's a problem. that's a big problem you know so these mid-level guys you know the brands that we like to usually fuck with right you know crown heads obviously dumbart and tobacco they've had no right oh espinosa was the fourth one thank you um those guys you know they they got to benefit from the fact that the bigger guys weren't there right you know and so the people would go to the you know those uh booths and they'd hang out they'd place their orders and stuff like that um they all had They had something new.

Crownheads had something new. They had a couple things going on. Espinosa had some things going on. Saka had some things going on.

And Tatuaje did too. So, you know, that, that was, that's kind of standard with the PCA. So that was good, you know, and I think that that helped them to some degree, but I don't know if the juice is worth the squeeze and, and you have to kind of look at it on, so there's so many variables here. Number one, we're in a cigar boom.

Everybody's fucking smoking cigars. It's, it went crazy. COVID, for whatever reason, That's the reason, everybody said, you know what, I'm going to fucking smoke. I'm like, okay, cool.

Right. I'm sitting at home, there's only so many things, I can only eat so many cookies. Yeah, it's so, I mean, it was something that nobody saw coming and, you know, and the sad part is it's not blanketing across the US because I know that there are still stores that have been struggling from COVID because of their over-regulations in their state. Right, yeah.

There's still some states, I don't think everybody's even completely open yet. I heard a horror story, I won't say the retailer's name, I heard a horror story of, like health department coming in checking their their air ratios and like all this shit they're measuring how far apart the chairs were and you're taking a tape measure that you're like oh and you only can have 10 people i mean like holy shit right we have four inspectors in here so you're at 14 right yeah well well you guys gotta get the fuck out you guys leave you're fucking up my we're back to 10 i can only have the 10 here so you gotta go you know like so that type of effect i think has had a you know has had a negative effect on some retailers obviously you can't make the The statement of, hey, everything's great for everybody, but can we indicate that we're in a cigar boom? Yes. So, that will benefit, you know, sales in general, period.

I don't think that it's an absolute necessity to generate those sales at that convention, you know? Case in point, kind of Roma, you know, they had... Right, they still sold everything they made, just like they always do. Right.

So, and you know that I'm sure that Altidist, Drew Estate, General, and all those guys had show deals or off-show deals or whatever, you know? New York State's got a deal of the week. Right. Whatever they call it.

They're not gonna call it PCA, but you know, they'll have a deal to offset. A stream deal or whatever they're calling it. So, you know, that's kind of my point, number one is, so we're in the cigar boom, right? Number two is, those guys benefited because those other big guys weren't there, right?

Right. Which works out pretty well. But again, would you still have capitalized on all that if you weren't there? you know and number three there weren't you know I don't I didn't see any of the really big wig retailers there's like there's probably four or five of them I mean Atlantic was there Abe was there I don't think Famous was there I didn't see anybody from Famous I don't think but we had heard though that Famous's websites down well they would have probably fixed by now well I haven't checked but that wouldn't probably have affected the show they would have made all the reservations Right, your buyers still come in.

" I don't know if CI was there. I don't know. I didn't see that. I wouldn't have seen those guys.

So, you know, like, so, when you have big retailers that make up a chunk of your sales, like, you know, let's say you do, let's say, and this is all speculative, I'm just spitballing here, I'm just throwing out numbers to use as a comparable. Let's say, you know, CI sits down with you as a brand owner and they spend $50,000. Right? And then your average retailer comes in and spends $2,000.

Right. So, like, you need 25 of those guys to equal the one. You know, and if none of those big guys were there, that's a tremendous offset. You know?

Right. Times it by three. So you got three guys that weren't there that all spent $50,000 to $150,000. Like, that's huge when it comes to all those expenses in Vegas in the convention.

Oh, sure. Right? and and to make matters worse no one will fucking tell you that it's a problem you know and that's always and like that's the bigger demise for me i think for the pca is like oh how was it oh great it was fucking great we were heard that from everybody still this and i'm like are you fuck like guys on the couch with us for 15 minutes sitting here and you're having a good day right so you know um look you know every other show that we've been doing that's a great point every And every other show that I've been to, it's really hard to access people. Right, just to hang out.

Right, it's really hard to access people. You're not making two, three, four trips around just to sit on the couch and shoot the shit. Yeah, so Saka always was sitting there talking with people, but you could still approach him. Right.

" or whatever, and if you want to sit down, you could partake. And he was one of the busier booths, right? Erik Espinosa, approachable. I never saw him sitting down.

I mean, he was always up walking around. Yeah, he was always kind of doing his round. And then dropping a joke on you, and then stepping back your way. He had a really funny joke.

" You know, Tatua, you know, you walked right up, you know, I walked up, the one time I was in the booth, He was bullshitting with our boyfriend, Rui, it was easy to crash, you know, there's a Padron order, so what a couple of these guys did, was they did a PCA cigar only, so you could buy it only if you were there, I don't know if it's the right answer, I don't know if it's the wrong answer, I'm not here to speculate on that, I will tell you this, it's an awesome, valiant effort, and I think that, you know, it's good to see companies try to continue to make this thing survive. So Crown Heads had a couple of PCA exclusives that we jumped on and Padrón did too. Right. Padrón had this, I think it's the 90th or 95 or some shit.

It's a round Gordo. Now the way Padrón said they were doing theirs is they were taking all the orders and then they were going to do production to meet the order. Correct. Crown Heads, I don't think, was that same way.

No, it's the same way. It is. I asked Wes that. Okay.

But there was somebody you asked, is this all available here? And they, you know, because they were making so many boxes. It depends on how many we got left and maybe you'll get them later. Yeah, maybe.

I don't know. So like, okay, well now you just threw the fucking whole PCA exclusive thing right out the fucking window. But you know, I mean, they cross their fingers. They sell everything at the PCA, but if they don't, yeah, they're not gonna eat them.

Yeah. Right. So, uh, we run into Ronnie, Ronnie Hayesha. Right.

You know, and, um, we're like, let's, well, let's go into Padrón. Wait, he's like, can you? I don't want to go to Padrón. Do you guys have Padrón?

I don't want to go by myself. I don't wanna go by myself. I don't wanna go by myself. I'm four feet tall.

I don't wanna go by myself. Oh, that's so nice. I love Ronnie. He's a solid five.

He gave me a big hug and everything. He told me he was 5'10". I believe him. At least 5'10".

Hey, his thigh is as big around as your arm. You gotta love Ronnie. Ronnie's fucking hilarious. He is.

He's great. I just wanted to carry him around my pocket. My own little Ronnie Lucky Charm. When he sat on Jack's lap.

He said Lucky Charm. Yeah, my own little Ronnie Lucky Charm. When he sat on Jack's, on the arm of the couch. So he sits down and we're in Espinosa and Ronnie sits down.

Ronnie walks up, sits on the arm of the couch next to Jack. It looked like a ventriloquist act. If he could have put his, if Jack would have put his hand up Ronnie's shirt. Yeah.

Cause Jack's one of the biggest men in the fucking industry. Jack's the biggest man you're ever going to meet. Yeah. And then, you know, Ronnie's not the biggest one.

Yeah. I imagine the same look would happen if I sat down next to him, but just, but I'm a bit, a little more stouter, but yeah, I mean, it could carry Ronnie around. Ronnie, tell the people it's funny. Anyway, what, we talk so we go into the yeah the padron booth yeah right sorry sorry i'm trying i've almost fucking tried to kill him several times i mean well i'll get into that maybe after the break or whatever just the fun of it all um so we go in you know and we look up the account and stuff and we place the order for the product you have the account number no oh my god don't please don't ask me for my account number your phone number i'm very irresponsible not exactly sure which I don't know which one is under that either.

We can wing this. We have a couple of options. So we put it together. We got the order.

Right. But, you know, George Padron comes right up to us and shoots the shit for 20 minutes. Right. The salesman had to walk away to do something with Ronnie or something.

Yeah. Yeah. So then, yeah, George Padron comes up. " I was like, "Oh, oh shit.

Okay. Talking about it. " He's not busy. So, like, it was awesome to have those experiences, to really kind of, to sit and bullshit with whoever you wanted, you know, and I'm grateful for those things, especially the Padrón one, because, you know, who the fuck am I?

Right, well, he almost said that. Right, well, I almost said it to him. Right. You know, but we had a conversation about the Millennium and stuff like that, and it went really, really well.

Yeah, why don't you ever give me credit for things I do? I don't, I just didn't, I don't know, I didn't know if you wanted it there. I don't care. I didn't want to say, well, this guy found them for me.

" Yes, Florida Cigar Club. Yes, baby, hold on. So, I didn't, yeah, I just didn't, I don't know, I always protect my friends. Why?

That's not going to hurt me. I don't know, just... He was thrilled that you had them. Yeah, but I didn't want, like, I didn't want him to ask you questions and you to feel uncomfortable.

Oh. And that was kind of how I took it, you know? So, like, I have no problem with having a conversation and kind of stonewalling situations, and I didn't want you to feel pressured into it. Oh, so you kind of looked at me and smiled and gave me, like, a look.

Just to kind of make it fun. " No, I would never, I would never. " Yeah, but same scenario. The staff put the picture together.

When the fuck have I ever put you out in a situation and just kind of left you twisting, like, all right, you got it. If anything, it's the polar opposite, and then I treat you like my five-year-old son, and I'm like, don't really fucking talk to me, I'll kick your ass. We'll get into that in part two. Or the Patreon.

Oh, by the way, we need to throw this at it, because we're about to have to take a break. The Patreon this week is going to be worth some reinstalling, or reinvesting, or whatever the hell it's called when you join up. Yeah, we're going to be... Subscribing, there you go.

We talk about stuff, we're pretty open here. We're very tired still. But there are some things that need to be addressed, and we will not address them on here. They will be addressed on the Patreon without question.

We're not even gonna review a cigar today. We have some. I don't think we can. Yeah, it's just not possible.

It'll be too long. I really have to go home to my wife eventually. She's still... I need to see her.

Are you coming home anytime today? It's been a very long time. It's been a very long time. So, you know, it was cool to have those experiences with those people.

Right. You know. I didn't even realize that was him at first. Yeah, I know.

That's why I walked away. I was like, you know, that was the guy. And I'm like, what guy? And then you pointed to the side of the...

I'm like, do you see him? He's right here. That's his father, and then that's him. You know what, when I turned, I saw him come out of the little closet, and he was pouring booze into a coffee cup.

That was amazing. But now, how does that translate? What does that tell you about the overall temple of the crowd of the show? The biggest accounts there are Rocky and Padrón, right, I would say?

Yeah. Oh, well, Fuente was there too. C. Newman, yeah.

but that those that was it right those are the those are the three biggest ones right so you know you could see rocky if you wanted to talk to you could find oh sure hey man how you doing we were there that second day well that wasn't his first time through but he just stopped in to swoop in swoop in just hey you got people i'm bored it's nice to have that a bit so like the whole the from my booth experience right uh that i've been doing it with roma for Powstanie and And then I was doing it with Roma when it was just Roma because Mike has always abused our friendship, but I don't mind it. You know, when I started really doing Polestania and Fable and Guaymaro, you always looked for the opportunity. Like when you're so fucking busy because you're in the Roma booth and you're trying to find a way to get away, you're like, okay, I can, I have to go to the bathroom. Yeah.

Hey, I'm going to walk away for, I'll be right back. I'm just going to do a lap, just, you know, I have regurgitated. and repetitively said, not only have I talked about Powstanie Broadleaf, Powstanie Habano, our limited edition, Fable, Guaymaro, I've also told everybody what the BA stands for. I've given you a tour in the EC.

I just want to step out. I need to stop talking for five minutes. It's hard as fuck to do it. I'm going to tell you right now, when you come back, somebody's going to be there waiting for you.

It's like, shit. That wasn't happening at all at this PCA. Not for anybody. Not for a single person.

No, you're right. I never, I didn't know. So yeah, but because we hung out in Espinosa probably the most just because they would be like their couches. But, uh, those are our people.

I love Jack. We love Hector. Right. You know, but Eric would walk in and out and you're right.

Anytime he came back, nobody was going, Hey Eric, this guy's fucking waiting for you, man. Right. Yeah. He would walk in, drop a joke on somebody and then he would just, it's not like Eric would be like, dude, I just want to eat my sandwich.

Right. You're like, I've seen that experience, you know, and you got to hide behind the table or something to eat your food. Right. And you fucking house a piece of pizza, like it's, you know, last meal or something, and just to keep going, right?

Like shit. Or you just skip food in general. Right. That you didn't need that at this show.

No. So what does that tell you about PCA? Is it? I mean, could this be the end?

I don't know. It's hard to say. All right. Right after this message, we'll be right after this break.

We'll come back and he'll finish saying. Oh, okay. Take a nice break. Gotta come right back.

We'll be right back. Hey, it's Mike too. Want to be part of the show? Go to We have tiers starting at just $5 a month!

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All right, welcome back. This is episode 182 of Cigar Hustler Podcast, the PCA Recap Edition. PCA Edition. And again, if you are just tuning in, if you know this first half, we're going to have this very detailed...

Patreon. Patreon. It's just got some dirt in it. It's just got some...

Oh, we got dirt. Heyeron's got some soul, you know, I'm really excited about this one, because we can, we're gonna break some shit down. Aaron, some laundry, and uh... Yeah, alleged laundry.

Alleged, alleged. We're always digging holes for ourselves, so there's a big hole we're digging. What the fuck, whatever. What do we care?

What are they gonna do? What are you gonna do, Mike? Fuck with our butts and pants! Absolutely, you can't fuck with our butts and pants.

That's only PayPal and Skip. PayPal and Skip. And we don't have any information on either one of them. Right.

Except now, Skip does FaceTime dudes. Oh, don't, don't, you can't be giving out the secrets. Just a little taste, just a little taste, just a little taste, just a little. You know, sometimes you got to recap, it was, I was all, you know, it's too bad that you threw that out there, because it was awesome to be on that level, now it's probably going to be taken away.

Or are you just going to do it more often? Yeah, I don't think so. I'm going to FaceTime him tonight. Good luck.

Skip, I enjoyed it so much the other day, that we can just do it every night now. So can the PCA survive, is the question. Can the PCA, see now, okay, here's my theory, they have, I've heard they have a five-year contract. Supposedly.

Supposedly. Whatever it is. But we don't know where in the five years they are. And you're talking about a five-year contract for the convention center of the SANS Expo.

Correct. You got to kind of, you know. Oh, yes, yes, correct. That's what I'm playing.

Yeah. So, apparently, from what I am thinking, with the contract, as long as they, I assume it's the same fee, they're not, like, getting 40% reduction in price, because they're only using 40% of the space. Right. So, they're able to monopolize this building any way they see fit on the flat price of yada yada dollars.

Uh-huh. So, I don't know if, because we're saying if they can survive, so if next year, let's say they're, let's say this was year four of the contract, well, wait, when did they come back from the other place? I don't know, 20-something. Right, now, so now, how do you want me to do fucking math?

I haven't slept in 48 hours. Right, so, let's say, let's say at the most, they probably have two years left. Okay, okay, all right, so then, so then, I don't know, I obviously haven't, it's never seen the contract, I don't know how it worked. Clause where they can go, we're just not going to do it anymore.

I'm sure you can say, hey, we're bankrupt. Well, that's what they would have to do, right. They'd have to go bankrupt, which didn't they do, or they just laid everybody off. Yeah, they just laid everybody off.

Can a non-profit go bankrupt? How does that work? I'm sure it can. I guess.

I don't know these things. I mean, it still costs money to run the business. I'm still not sure what EBITDA is, so... Well, we can call Skip.

Break it down for you. EBITDA. He won't do my FaceTime later. Uh, so anyway, uh, I think they write out the current contract and then they're going to have to make some decisions on what they're going to do unless they're just go, you know, we're done, but drop the mic, drop the mic, Johnny, we're out.

We can't go anywhere else. But the problem is that everybody that's on that floor will always say, Hey, it's been great. Oh, well, we were told from some exhibitors they already bought for next year. Oh yeah.

We bought it. Which I mean, I assume there's some discount buying. Yes, of course, damn. Right.

And then you roll the dice. When they canceled for COVID, did they offer refunds and some people didn't take them? I don't know. " Right.

But if you go bankrupt, probably no money can get back, because you still, you don't get away scot-free. It's, you know, pennies on the dollar, whatever you owe everybody. Yeah. So, I mean, you just re- Oh, yeah, so.

So you're gonna, you know, if we got $30,000 out of somebody, we're gonna do that. I don't think the PCA, that was just a theory. I don't think PCA goes belly up. I don't think they go away.

I just think that. I think the convention part of it. Let me know when I can talk. I'm talking now, please.

I believe the convention. No, I believe I was talking. I don't believe the PCA. The PCA is a, the French version.

I'll just, I'll come back. The PCA. Let me know when you're done. Oh, you're so rude.

Why am I not allowed to talk? I was talking. I'm on a roll here. No, you weren't.

I was speaking. And then you know where I'm going with it because I've told you and now you're jumping on it. Go ahead. No, it's your, it's your show.

Oh, it's what everybody said they saw. I was a true star of the show is what they said. He does all the work. Yep.

Okay. You're just a pretty face. All right. Go ahead.

I'm done. This is what happens when you have 48 hours together with somebody and you're both tired and going like, man, fuck that guy. Now he's hitting buttons. Turn your mic back on.

The biggest problem in our industry, I think, is just this intrinsic apathy. With conventions. Yeah, go ahead. So, go ahead.

I think that the defensive part of the organization stays, but they might have to redo something with the convention. Yeah. Either they just go, you know what, we're going to have to raise money some way else, and then we'll still fight the good fight. It's a great idea, Mike.

I don't know. I love where your head's at. I don't know. I don't know how they get the money.

I don't, I don't know where they're getting it. Uh, they're staying up front of somebody else's convention with a cup. Money for the PCA, please! Money for the PCA!

Well, they're trying to raise 60 grand or something, right? Oh yeah, I got an email. They'd like you to donate, then we need $60,000. And like, that's not even a drop in the bucket for what they do.

You think they could come up with $60,000? You think that'd be easy? You think so? Yeah.

Especially right when there's shows. The struggle. Going on. The struggle's real.

They got money from people. Yeah. But they brought a lot of people back. It's not just the one guy anymore.

It's not Scott Pierce anymore, just sitting there answering. Oh, yeah? Yeah, they brought back. Well, it's the show week, so I would assume there's things going on.

He's not the only guy back there selling space for next year. He's sitting there, you know, at a table by himself in the 60% of the building that they're not using. Right. Going.

Come see me in my office. Big deal! Big deals coming in here, sir! So the other...

I'll put you in me DMs! So the big, so the wall was up and they had like two sections, and one section was for registration, which is normally outside in the hallway. Right, normally out front. But they had this whole gigantic area.

Right, the whole front quarter. Yeah, for registration. I mean, they couldn't... And why couldn't they have moved the table closer to the door?

Why do you have to walk through? You gotta earn it. Maybe that's where the plugs are, the electricity or something like that for? Like, we've never had to do this before.

Where's the closest plug? They could've put like a We could have put like a skate park in there or something. Call the union. Yeah.

I mean, you know. Oh, they could have got Tesla to come in and give test rides on that other side. That would have been great. They could have put slides up.

So when you climb up the ladder, you slide right down. Oh, you get your ID. You slide right in. Wee!

Happy night. All right, come on in. We got space for this. Pepin going down the slide.

Pepin was not there? No, some other old cigar guy. I mean, my father's cigar was there, but Pepin was not there. No, no, I understand.

But I saw a picture today of two older guys. Two older guys? I don't remember the names. David Garofalo?

No, no. Older. Much older. Yeah.

I don't know who posted. Somebody posted. I don't know what's going on. So much going on.

So I honestly think. I'm not going to be sure if I was on Instagram. I could have been Snapchatting. I don't even have an account.

Mike, I got to be honest. I think that you're onto something. You think it's a good idea? When you say.

I did not give away your idea. That was my opinion, and I thought it was a good idea, but I didn't give your thing away. So please, feel free. Go ahead.

When you say that the convention. Hello. Turn down my mic. When you say the convention...

You're correct, sir! Go ahead. I don't have the energy to pummel you to death. I know.

But I might try. I'll call on your wife. He's being made to say, Brett, Nate. Go ahead.

And he ignores your phone calls. I mean, you know, if they continue to go in this direction, then I think that the convention goes away as a whole, and they try and gain money from other sources. S. I feel it's hard to police.

It is. It's more on an honor system. Which it's, yeah, it's cigar people. But like, let's say, hey, we're going to do this and then we're going to cap it at X.

Like, you know, if you achieve this number, like some of those guys, like, let's say, hey, if you can give us, you know, 50 grand a year. Right. for some of those bigger accounts, whatever, $100,000 a year, that's where your cap's at. If you can just cap that out and you have 5, 10 of the big accounts.

What's it called when you join certain churches? You're tiding? Yeah, tithe. Tithe.

Yeah, tithe the PCA. You write down a little piece of paper how much you're going to give them every year. But then it would take also some effort on the retailer's end saying, hey, these guys support PCA. This whole section of cigars, Or I'm only going to buy from companies that support PCA or something like, you know.

Do you think consumers care? I don't think that it's really up to the consumer to care. I think it's up to the retailer to care and it's up to the brand or the manufacturer to care. Right, but let's say, let's say I really like Powstanie cigars.

Right. Okay. Your shop carries Powstanie cigars, but Powstanie does not contribute to the PCA, so you decide, you know what, I'm not going to carry those anymore. Okay, well, I think that the consumer gets concerned when government regulation says, hey, one guy just shit their pants, and now we're all wearing diapers, right?

When you start to see those effects, like, now your smoking fucking regulation has changed to 25, and, you know, now it can't be north of the chiclets, you know, all those stupid fucking rules that they make, like, that's when the consumer's like, what the fuck happened? Well, I'll tell you what happened. PCA took a shit, nobody fucking funded it, nobody fought for legislation and their rights, and you know, now we're fucking treated, well, we're always treated as the redheaded stepchild of fucking tobacco, like we're the fucking demon child. Do you think the two-cigar-a-month guy even knows there's a PCA?

No. That's what I mean. No, he doesn't. No, he doesn't.

It's, you know, it's the same fucking shit, like, you know, I don't care what party you support, party you support it's not i don't give a shit i think that they're both evil so um you know you fucking had this fiscal budget sliding under trump's regime well oh guess what uh so we're gonna budget all this and tobacco is now gonna be 21 like what the fuck how would that happen that's not that's not that's not the budget you know like these rules and shit that come into play that those are things the pca is fighting for so you gotta back that company 100 but they need i I don't know if they need fresh blood, or new ideas, or people that give a shit, but it seems like they're going to the reception of the brand-nose manufacturers on the floor, and they're saying, yeah, it's great, even though it's not fucking great, just because they have to be the best, and then they're like, all right, well, we're just going to continue to let this ship sink, and we're just going to hang out until everybody's fucking drowning, and they're going to wonder where the fuck something went wrong. Let me ask you a comparable question. Tell me. You have guns?

Yes. You like guns? Yes. Are you in favor of all the upcoming gun regulations?

Never in favor of regulations. Okay, do you give money to the NRA? I don't. There you go.

Same thing. So, it's up to the brand owners and the retailers to handle the contributions to the NRA. I understand that, but do you only buy guns? $100 to the NRA ain't going to make a fucking difference.

But do you only buy guns that contribute to the NRA? First of all, I've never ever been educated on a gun saying these people support NRA, these guys don't. Exactly. So, now you're asking the shop owners to tell people about the PCA.

I am. What about Cigar Rights of America? What do they do? I don't know.

Are they still around? Yeah, I saw a guy with a shirt on at the show. You saw one guy? I saw one guy with a platonic shirt.

He was backed by the Cigars for Warriors people. Okay. That was the guy that was talking to Storm when you walked up and interrupted. Putting his brochures out on the table.

Really? Yeah. 's around anymore. Exactly.

Maybe they're linked up with the PCA. I don't know. I think somebody who used to run the CRA now works for the PCA, or did work, or allegedly is gonna work, I don't know, we should get Scott Pearson a phone and see what he's doing. The real one?

No. Ours. He's very busy right now. He's a lot funnier than the other guy.

Yeah. I don't know, it doesn't look like he's busy. Oh, good. Anyway, back to your thing.

That's kind of my take on it. I think it's a great idea. Yeah, I just don't see the honor system working. Maybe not to all, but it will work for some.

Well, there will be a percentage that will continue to donate money to, you know, like Skip said, you know, we don't want our refund back. You keep the money because you're doing what you're supposed to be doing with the money anyway, so, you know, we're okay with you keeping our whatever it was. As a human being, I have to believe, and this is gonna sound so fucking crazy because I'm in the cigar industry. I have to believe that 80% of the people are fucking good.

I rely on the kindliness of strangers to help me out. I don't know, man. I just feel like it's a tight niche. " But then you could also make that, you could turn that into the bigger dick, right?

Like, I dropped 250 on them. I gave them 250k. Fuck all you. That would be matched by somebody or topped by somebody.

Because, they're the biggie. Maybe, yeah. It's the same scenario. Oh, you put in the 250?

That's cool, let me go grab my couch and see if I got another fucking 300. Because, there are people in this industry that got that kind of flow. It could be easily funded by the top dogs. Well, Eddie Tarzana made that big donation.

He donated 10 grand, yeah. " Actually, other people did prior to that. Before him, right. So, I mean, maybe he was trying to match somebody else.

I didn't see many after him. Well, we don't know if there was any media coverage on it. Oh, who's gonna do it? Not tell nobody.

If you're trying to do it to be the bigger dick, you're not gonna do it. I know, you know, one of the press releases with the fucking, we've always made fun of them when they always talk about the good that they do. Oh, yeah, but... It's the same scenario.

I think they got wind of our stories because nobody's doing that anymore. We're very generous. Oh, shit, they're making fun of us. Maybe we should just do good things and just not fucking talk about it.

It's cool. But we give them milk and eggs. We gave them the eggs. The eggs.

Come on, the eggs. I mean, what the fuck? For God's sakes. Everybody.

You know, no one attacked us. You know, no one came at us aggressively at the show. No, no, nobody. You know, of all the things that we say.

Nope. Well, okay. Are we going to do the black label thing here or on the other show? We can talk about that on the show.

On this show? On the other show. Okay. I mean, we had no issues there, though.

I don't think that went as well as you think it did in your head. I mean, I stood back. I didn't... I didn't...

I stood over there with... Without going into detail. It isn't that I think that it went well or it didn't well, it's that I don't fucking care. Well, no, exactly.

Right. I mean, you purposely went up there to say something just to see what would happen. Oh, I just... I'm...

No, that's not true. I don't want to have... Hey, watch this. I don't want to have conflict.

If I can avoid conflict... We got to change the whole format of this show. If we can make bygones be bygones, I would rather that. Change the whole format of the show now, Mike.

No, you're missing the point. I would prefer not to have it, but I'm not fucking scared of it. We're the bad boys of cigar media. For some strange reason.

It doesn't scare me. I'm not intimidated by anybody. Everybody else is all nice and matching shirts. But I'm going to tell you, I'll tell you, I got to tell you one thing as you continue to fucking rattle on.

And I touched on this lately before, you know, it took me a while to get to a point where I'm like, you know what? There's a point where I'm like, you know what? Fuck you guys. Because forever I would let people fucking tell me that I wasn't qualified.

I would let them shove their fucking finger in my face. They'd talk shit about me. They'd say all these things. And, you know, I kind of took it and said, oh shit, I'm really sorry.

Now I'm like, wait, no, fuck you. You're not fucking qualified to tell me that I'm not fucking qualified, right? That's really what it boils down to. You need to get a point when they say, I don't even care what you're saying.

I don't care what they're saying. You just said you're going to tell them. No, I remember your glue. It bounces off me and sticks to you.

Somebody said, you know what, I don't even care what you say. I mean, brief recap. I feel like we scared Pete Hernandez a little bit. Oh, no, you did.

That definitely happened. You scared him. I feel like I try to scare him. It was an episode of Housewives of New Jersey.

I harassed the ever-living shit out of Alfredo. He's just unfazed at this point. The abuse level is so high. He's numb.

Yeah. And he started giving you information last night. I'm like, why would you do this? Why would you tell me more?

That's what they tell Keanu around here, we're like, you need to just stop telling me things. Why would you give me ammo? He showed me a picture of his new girlfriend he met on Uber eating. He's turned into a dating site.

That's nice. It's quite the parlay. Here's your sandwich and what are you doing later? What are you doing later?

I see that you only ordered for one. That's right. So you ordered for one and no dessert. That's so evil.

Perhaps you would like something. I've got a guy's order in the car, and I could just easily say the ice melted. Yeah, he's got a soda in there. So...

I carry extra forks. I don't know what the fuck we were talking about. Oh, so Alfredo and stuff. Alfredo.

Yeah, so it's fun to harass him. He handles himself pretty well. And I could use the same joke over and over again with different badges of people, which makes it even better. So, you know, when it was different clusters, I would always...

But there was one time where I walked up to him and he goes, "Now is not the time. That was not the time. Probably a new customer. So I, very politely, did not throw Alfredo under the bus.

Just let it go. I never want to hurt the guy. Right, you don't want to intentionally hurt anybody. Yeah.

But yeah, we rattled a couple people, I think. I think we rattled some people. I kept going up to Tyler when he was in crowds of people like I'd never met him before. Oh, I just wanted to meet you.

You're such a nice man. I see you all the time on social media. Yeah, you have the great stories. " Like, "No, no, you're very busy.

Maybe another time. Get that done some other time. You know, it was funny too, it was like, we didn't really take pictures with anybody. Oh, we didn't, no.

And so we're having dinner the last night, like, man, no one took photos with us or nothing. Right. And then as we're leaving, it's like, picture, picture, picture, picture, picture. Oh, you're leaving, I need your picture, you're going to take a picture, you're going to take a picture.

Well, there's only three. Well, it's still a lot. Three more than we had the other two days, so. I know, you go through social media, you're on the airplane and stuff, like, oh, look at these people taking pictures together.

I'll tell you what, yeah. Look, none of us. Were we even there? I feel like I rattled Terrence, too, from Agnorosa.

Oh, yeah, he was not expecting that at all. That was good. I don't want to get into the details of what was said, but it was awesome. Shout out to Lenny at Owlier for loading me up on that one.

Oh, and hooking us up with all the accessories we needed. Oh, yeah, man. We walked in. We needed a lighter and a cutter.

Did you guys just get here? Oh, I'm sorry, here you go ahead. Lenny's like, here's your gear. Like an air freshener?

Here's an air freshener. Right, here's your gear. Lenny approved. Here's your lighter.

All these little bags. Everything in a bag. Everything in a bag? These little bags, he just already has them pre-packaged, here's your sticker, here's your air freshener, here's your hand sanitizer, here's your lighter, a little extra can of fuel, and then your cutter.

And the cutter you might be able to take home with you because it's a safety cutter. " Click, click, click, click. " It's brilliant. It is.

It's Lenny approved. Goddammit. We need to steal the idea for next year. Cigar Hustler approved.

Cigar Hustler. You know, I'm all for getting... First of all, I'm not bringing any of that shit there. Lenny probably drives there.

Oh, that's true. Yeah, yeah. You'd have to ship it in. But I think we should do a little podcast lighters or something to give out to our Patreon people and stuff like that.

Yeah. I think that'd be cool. We should totally talk to Jeff about that. Maybe he can go through Weissel or something.

But... Alright, we've got 15 minutes. 15 minutes, 10-ish. We had lots of time.

10 minutes of time. What else do we want to talk about? There was no really, so like the, there's a main source of a place where everybody kind of hangs out, and it used to be called Circle Bar, and it was at the Venetian, but then it was the bar at the Palazzo, and then that bar has now turned into this square fucking thing, and it doesn't have a lot of seats, and everybody kind of overpours out of it. There wasn't a lot of people there.

No. No, there wasn't. I mean, it's usually the point, because it's right there in the main strip where everybody's got to go in or out to get to their rooms. Right.

And you can't, what you got to like, and people's got to fight to get through, right? You got to like, if you're not a cigar person and you got to walk through that, you can like, fuck, you're like, oh, yeah, I saw people pulling their shirts up over their noses, which I mean, you probably shouldn't be in Vegas if you have a problem with smoking, but whatever. I always find it's odd that you see couples, but you'll see the guys wearing flip flops and a bathing suit and a t-shirt with or without sleeves. And then the woman's got a sparkly dress on.

Yeah, well, that guy doesn't give a fuck. Right. Well, it's Vegas. The dress code for Vegas is whatever you want to wear.

You got to do what you want to do. You see fucking bad dudes in bathing suits down in the casino lobby. I'm like, go put a shirt on. Oh, women with bigger girls with bikinis on that maybe, you know, God bless them.

No shame in the game. Right. With fishnet bathing suit covers, which cover more than the bathing suit. Yeah.

That's very interesting. But yeah, what was kind of crazy is that that bar never really kind of overflowed. No, it just started to last night as we were leaving. Yeah, and that's never the case.

No, but Coop was showing photos the night we were there, how dead it was. Right. The night before, I guess, but that young man from Espinosa. Tyler?

Tyler. He said it was busy, so maybe he was there later or earlier. Well, that's something else I was going to address with you. Yes.

And I didn't know we were going to talk about it on Patreon or talk about it here, but I'll talk about it here. Okay. Unless it gets really good, then we're gonna stop talking. Being in this industry, I'm going on my 13th year, you've seen a lot, and you know, it's really kind of perspective-wise, really kind of take a step back and view all of it as a whole.

I've seen companies come out of nowhere and rise. Right. And be consistent for a few years and then just totally fucking turn to dust. You know, just nothing, not relevant at all, but maybe still lingering on.

I've seen companies pop up, and then instantly, a year or two, go away. I've seen sales reps go up, and then I've seen sales reps disappear. " But there is a lot of fucking failure and a lot of disappointment in the eyes of people. It's like, you see this, and you're just like, man, it's kind of heartbreaking, you know, and remarkable and fascinating all at the same fucking time.

So then I see youth coming into the show, and I see them excited. Yeah, this was the first year when it was younger support staff. So like, I was, I remember being like one of the first, when I was younger, when I was younger, and I was excited to go to the show, and the show would always humble me. And you know, like I always took it all in and you know, I didn't feel that this time, you know, and then I'm looking at these young kids and I'm like, man, it's gonna be rough, bro.

You're either, you know, you're either gonna fucking, you're gonna have to have a strong will and desire to fuck it, 20 year plan, right? I'm gonna fucking win and at this and I'm gonna make it, or you're just gonna skate along and be June, or you're gonna, or more often than not. You're gonna go away and find a desk job. Right, find something else to do.

I'm just, you know what, I'm just tired of not. Or you're one of those guys that can't go anywhere else. Yeah. Yeah.

So, I do whatever I can to encourage somebody that gets into this business. When they're a brand owner or a manufacturer, even if they're a rep, but I'm not gonna sugarcoat anything. I'm gonna say, hey, listen, there's gonna be a lot of things that suck here. I'm not saying that you can't make it.

I'm just saying, it's not all. It's not gonna be fun. Right. It ain't all fucking sunshine and rainbows for sure.

For sure. So, um, but now that I have like a, a, a data point, sorry for the stretching. I'm very, very stiff. Now that I have a data point of like over 12 years, it's fucking remarkable.

And it's, and it's really kind of sad. Like in every industry, you can see who the best of the best is, who kind of up and comes And then all of the failure behind it and the failure is tremendous. It really fucking is. And when you hear people talk and you've done it long enough, if, for one, if I don't feel like you're going to listen to me, I'm just going to listen to you and say, okay, wow, this guy's totally fucked.

Or I'm going to say, okay, maybe the guy might be on to something, you know, but be that as it may, some people respect my opinions and a lot of people don't, you know? And I'm fine with that. I'm perfectly fine. I prefer my niche group small and effective badasses.

So, it's just that simple. Just that easy. I just can't get over the fact. It's just, you look at some of these guys and you're like, man, I don't know, bro.

I don't know. I'm going to keep tabs on you and I'm going to see how this goes. Right. I'm going to watch you.

I like you. Thank you. And I'm curious. I'm curious to see how this pans out, but...

But it's gonna be a long road. Right. It's gonna be a long fucking road. Alright, we got five minutes left here.

Favorite part of the show? Favorite thing that we did or whatever happened when we were there? You wanna know what my favorite part of the show was? It's gonna be totally off the wall.

It's gonna be fucking hanging out at the media house. See, that was mine too. With Coop and Bear. Coop and Bear and Ben and Aaron Loomis.

And Aaron. Well, Aaron was there, right? Aaron's always there, just very quiet, very quiet, he makes me look chatty, but it happens with Charlie too at Half Wheel, he's not very chatty at all, you kept walking up, goosing him, trying to get him to do something, he's got to work, that's different, there are plenty of times where I've hung out with Charlie, and you get into these in-depth conversations, and it's really great when you have Skip in the mix, because then it's a challenge, like the data and the information is, you know, we covered that on another show. - Yeah, it's fucking remarkable, but so, you know, I've never, we've never had that, like, kind of intimacy with the media guys.

- Right, with those guys, right, yeah, I felt like we were in. - Right, well, and you didn't have a camera in front of you, it was just, you know, raw information and data and opinions, and, like, that's the type of shit that I totally fucking dig, you know, like, it's so cool, 'cause, you know, there's so, everybody's got different points of view, you know, and you're not talking to guys that are just kind of winging it, you're talking to guys. These are the guys, they have the fucking info, they have lived this shit, you know, so that was definitely the best part, I would never fucking miss that again, if we're invited, I'm going, my second favorite, was also not at the show, it was at En Fuego, hanging out at En Fuego with Mike and Char, and watching the UFC fight, and kind of bullshitting, and like, you know, just the chill there, that was fucking badass too. All right, worst thing, let's wrap this up, worst part of the show.

" I'm like, "Dude, stop. Go lie to everybody fucking else. Just, you know, just tell me, just say, oh man, it was, yeah, we had some good numbers one day, but man, this has been fucking tough, and I don't fucking know. " Probably.

You know, I would have loved to have, but you know, you're never gonna hear it. " Yeah. I mean, I don't even know what the fuck that means, because you're already bleeding out come day two, you know? Right.

Oh, no, no, dude, no. So that was the worst part of the show. The worst part is continuing to see. The overzealous optimism of the entire thing.

Right, that sadness of not, well, so then what should we do to, so if it's perfect, then we don't need to change it. No, don't change it. I heard somebody did say that. This is perfect.

Don't change a thing. They should not change a thing. I forget who that was. " They didn't give any...

We're that busy. They didn't give 10 grand away to a retailer, I don't think. Maybe they did, but I didn't see it. I forget who...

They... Cocktail hour two to five. Everybody off the floor go get some drinks. Yeah, the last three hours of the thing.

I'm sorry? What? And they're free. Yeah, that was a great idea.

That was solid. Right. You don't need to buy anything. We heard the show, the pre-show little event wasn't any good.

We couldn't go 'cause we were traveling, but... I don't know, that's speculative, we didn't witness that. No. You know what I mean?

But I had more than one person tell me what it was like. Yeah. And everybody said the same thing. It just felt...

Three cigars, no ashtrays, concrete floors, folding tables and chairs. It just felt sad. Yeah. It just felt PCA.

Like when you're smoking in somebody's garage. Yeah. It was the picture that was painted. Not my garage, 'cause I have a couch.

And you have a nice painting? Yeah. Very nice painting. Very nice painting.

Very nice painting. So... So yeah, I feel like we just covered it. that's pretty good anything else what was your so your best is the best but the best thing was media night too what was your worst or or actually you know the two phone calls from skip and mike uh where they actually that was pretty cool they went to my opinion oh yeah they both want yeah they were right both skips it put them on the phone but i need to speak to bdp right he wants to talk to you and he asked me a question but then he just wanted to give me shit because my wife was at a pool bar or something well yeah that's a segue right how can your wife go out your wife always tries to one up when you're at these places what's going on your wife's gonna He's going to have a great time.

You get all sorts of phone numbers and stuff there. You go, I don't care. I got cameras all over the house. She's going home alone, whichever way you want to look at it.

Damn it. Yeah, she knows better. If she don't pay for the drinks, I'm winning. She keeps it outside.

You can't go to my house. He'll know. Oh no, there's a camera outside. Yeah, that's what I'm saying.

Not even at your house. No. Right. Not even at the house.

Right. And then the media night, that was, that was amazing. And I almost backed out of that because I was tired. I was tired.

I know. Thank you for making me go, because I would have, yeah, that would have, that would have been terrible. Like I said, brother, you want to roll with the big dogs. Can't be peeing like a puppy.

I'm very tired. We're doing this. We got two days, and we are crushing. Right, yeah.

We might sleep. We're not exactly sleeping. We're hitting every fucking avenue possible. We're gonna, we're gonna fucking have contact with as many people and get as much, and we're gonna fucking soak this whole thing in.

Okay, I know what the bad thing was. It was a situation we can't talk about here that we'll talk about on the next show. So, that was a little, not what you did, but it was a little embarrassing for me that that had to happen. You ain't gotta worry about shit when you were me, brother.

No, I know, I know, I understand it. Don't worry. I was sitting there, I text my wife and I told her what happened and she was not surprised. Oh, he stepped in?

Yeah, fucking ain't right, I did. No, no, no, no, you don't have to talk to him. Everybody eats, everybody smokes. How are you?

How are you? Nice to meet you. All right, this has been the Cigar Hustle Podcast PCA Recap. Yeah.

We're not sure what's going to happen. The cigar that everybody's talking about? The Sargent? Is the Sarge.

The Sarge. The cigar that everybody's talking about has terrible band and terrible packaging, but apparently it's an amazing cigar. We're going to review it next week. And we're going to fucking review it because...

On the Patreon. I'm very excited about it. I bet you it's going to be a fucking sleeper banger for sure. If the people that I've talked to about it have loved it, it's going to be a sleeper fucking banger, without question.

All right. We have two of that other one from them, too, that we had. The Fiat Lux? Whatever.

No, no. The other one that was wet. Uh, the La Parcha? Yeah.

The La Parcha. All right. We might do that one, too, because we still have two of those. All right.

Because we already know a flaw with that thing. So. Yeah. We do.

But it's delicious. But anyway. Okay. We're going to go.

Thank you very much. We got another show to do. Yeah. Bye.

A Cigar Hustlers podcast, its owners, and its sponsors take no responsibility for the opinions or statements made by the talk show host or their guests. Statements or show topics are not necessarily the beliefs of Mike and Mike Productions or the podcast providers, and opinions between talk show hosts may differ. It is not our intention to libel, incite, or hurt anyone's feelings. We invite you to write the show's host, Mike Szczepankewicz, with any feedback or suggestions These broadcasts have presented and made public as entertainment in the hope that they will be entertaining to the audience.

This has been a Cigar Hustlers Podcast, a Mike and Mike production. m. for all new episodes. Hi, I'm doing, I'm Hoostoe-y-Raw.

Yeah, we just don't have to do a single, uh, single podcast ever again. Perfect. I'm good, Mike and Mike. How are you guys doing?

The Hojo Deeb. Hojo! It's the Hojo! He didn't even let him fuck it up all the way.

I couldn't get past Hojo! I don't even have to try it. He's not even gonna try it. We're gonna, we're gonna cover a lot of ground here, Mike.

All right. Try to keep up. That's a sign of a good podcast. It could be like four cigars when I walked in the door.

All right, end this.

Show Notes

All the info you did and didn't want to know about the PCA....we give it to you straight